The dark tetrad

What motivates the darker side of personality?

The Dark Tetrad of personality (i.e., sub-clinical traits of sadism, psychopathy, narcissism and Machiavellianism) has demonstrated use in predicting self-reported risk-taking behaviour, but more research is needed.

Studies indicate psychopaths are more likely to be impulsive thrillseekers, narcissists tend to be egotistical attention-seekers, Machiavellians tend to be strategic manipulators, while sadists appear to receive gratification from inflicting cruelty on victims. However, the explanatory power of the Dark Tetrad of personality in the prediction of everyday risk-taking behaviours has yet to be determined.

Participants (N = 216) completed an online survey and the study aimed to predict both self-reported and behavioural risk-taking from the four dark trait variables. Though the Dark Tetrad traits were not significant predictors of behavioural risk-taking, sadism emerged as the strongest predictor of self-reported risk-taking and outcomes of this study suggested that psychopathy and sadism share strong connections.

The practical implications of high levels of sadism or psychopathy combined with a heightened risk-taking disposition carries antisocial implications and underscores the need for harm reduction. The findings also suggest sadism may be more prevalent in the general population than initially surmised. This work highlights the need for identifying potential clinical interventions for extreme levels of the Dark Tetrad traits and more exploration is needed to detect the underlying mechanisms of the dark personality-risk relationship.

https://doi.org/10.1080/00049530.2021.1955224